City staff, consultants wrap up Main Street concepts

Chula Vista  Citizens gathered Thursday at the Otay Recreation Center to provide their thoughts on a plan that aims to improve and beautify Main Street in Chula Vista.

Outreach by city staff, consultants and representatives from the San Diego Association of Governments began in October, when they introduced the project for the section of road from Industrial Boulevard to Interstate 805, a 3.3-mile stretch.

Elements for the final alternative of the Main Street Master Plan include a vision, identity and themes for Main Street, bike and pedestrian mobility and safety, aesthetically pleasing and environmentally sound landscaping and a connection to Otay Valley Regional Park and other points of interest.

Alternatives were brought back last month with a focus on three themes.

The agriculture/ranch theme signifies the importance of the lemon orchards in the city’s early history in this community, while the river or bayside village theme develops a connection with the bay and the commerce theme is an overall part of the fabric of the community.

The city hired KTU+A Landscape Architects, which will refine the design alternatives to incorporate citizen feedback.

The main concerns of citizens include balancing the needs of pedestrians, bicyclists and motorists, building continuous sidewalks and having them properly marked, and improved lighting.

Architect John Taylor talked about identifying connections along the project area on Main Street.

“Each one of these concepts were accompanied by a pass at what the streetscape might be, what plant material we might anticipate and how it would relate to districts,” he said.

The idea is to create a completed street, bringing all of the themes together.

The firm also looked at roadway geometry with regard to the widths of right of ways and what they could accommodate as far as transit.

The company also explored the idea of a traffic roundabout.

“We think it has some real benefits in terms of traffic calming on Main Street, but ultimately it would have to be vetted through an engineering process,” Taylor said. “We also considered the amount of on-street parking. Right now, many areas aren’t striped and formally identified as parking.”

The Main Street improvement have to do with amendments to the city’s general plan, a document that shows the vision of the city.

“It’s different sections into the future,” said city planner Miguel Tapia. “When city staff looked at that area, that felt that Main Street was going to continue to be an industrial zone, but the corridor lacks a lot of amenities.”

Because of that, city staff and council members determined that something had to be done to improve the safety and quality of life issues for those area residents and businesses.

“We need to address those needs and beautify the street,” Tapia said.

Main corridors would have some kind of icon as a gateway marker and roundabouts could be used as a place to add art such as a sculpture.

“The importance of creating an identity is because of the lack of identity that it has now,” said landscape architect Kurt Carlson.